USA

04 May 2023; MEMO: US President, Joe Biden, on Thursday signed a new executive order to sanction those who threaten the "peace, security or stability" in Sudan, saying that the violence in the country "must end", Anadolu News Agency reports.

"I join the peace-loving people of Sudan and leaders around the world in calling for a durable ceasefire between the belligerent parties," he said in a statement.

04 May 2023; MEMO: Technical personnel from Turkiye, Russia, Ukraine and the United Nations will meet on Friday to discuss a deal that allows the exports of Ukrainian grains on the Black Sea, Turkish Defence Minister, Hulusi Akar, said, Reuters reports.

WASHINGTON, May 4. /TASS/: The US has nothing to do with the recent drone attack on the Kremlin, US National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby said on MSNBC television on Thursday.

"We still don’t really know what happened," he said, adding that Washington is still assessing the situation.

Kirby said he had seen comments by Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Thursday, which stated Washington was involved in the incident.

WASHINGTON, May 4 (Reuters) - A group allied with Donald Trump's bid for the 2024 Republican nomination is setting records for outside political spending early in a U.S. presidential campaign as he looks to box out his nearest rival Ron DeSantis before the Florida governor even launches a campaign.

The Trump-aligned Make America Great Again Inc group, known as MAGA Inc, spent more than $7 million in the first four months of 2023 on television ads attacking DeSantis, disclosures to the Federal Election Commission show.

WASHINGTON, May 4 (Reuters) - U.S. company Westinghouse unveiled plans on Thursday for a small modular reactor to generate virtually emissions-free electricity that could replace coal plants or power water desalinization and other industries.

Rita Baranwal, the Westinghouse Electricity Co's top technology officer, said the reactor, dubbed AP300 for its planned 300 Megawatt capacity, will not use special fuels or liquid metal coolants unlike some other next-generation reactors.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and three other members of the far-right extremist group were convicted Thursday of a plot to attack the U.S. Capitol in a desperate bid to keep Donald Trump in power after the Republican lost the 2020 presidential election.

A jury in Washington, D.C., found Tarrio guilty of seditious conspiracy after hearing from dozens of witnesses over more than three months in one of the most serious cases brought in the stunning attack that unfolded on Jan. 6, 2021, as the world watched on live TV.

NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump called a writer’s claims that he raped her at a Manhattan department store “the most ridiculous, disgusting story,” testifying in a deposition shown in court Wednesday that the allegations were “made up” and that the assault never happened.

Lawyers for accuser E. Jean Carroll played about 30 minutes of excerpts from the former president’s deposition, including his emphatic denial of the longtime advice columnist’s accusation that he attacked her in the mid-1990s in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room.

ATLANTA (AP) — Police arrested a man accused of opening fire inside the waiting room of an Atlanta medical practice Wednesday, killing one woman and wounding four. Workers and others in a bustling commercial district took shelter for hours during the manhunt.

Authorities swarmed the city’s midtown neighborhood shortly after noon in search of the shooter. Police said in a statement that the suspect, whom they identified as 24-year-old Deion Patterson, was captured in Cobb County, just northwest of Atlanta.

03 May 2023; MEMO: The US State Department warned, on Wednesday, that deepening ties between Iran and the Syrian government should be of great concern to the world, after Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi met counterpart, Bashar Al-Assad, in Damascus in the first visit by an Iranian head of state since Syria's war began in 2011, Reuters reports.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Nations chief warned on the eve of World Press Freedom Day that the media is under attack in every corner of the world and urged all nations to stop the targeting of truth and those who report it.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called the 50% increase in the killing of media workers in 2022 “unbelievable,” stressing that freedom of the press “is the foundation of democracy and justice” and it is under threat.